A Day of Pancakes

Last Tuesday was Pancake Day (or Mardi Gras or Shrove Tuesday depending on your preference) and the whole internet (or at least the bits that I looked at) exploded with pictures of people making pancakes. I had grand plans to join them in this pancake frenzy, but unfortunately I was feeling under the weather and had to give it a miss.

Luckily I was feeling much restored by the weekend and so yesterday, rather late to the party, I had my very own pancake day! Pancakes for both lunch and for dinner, in total three different fillings.

The all-important pancake mix*:

To 70g of plain flour I added 1 medium egg, 100ml of skimmed milk and 50ml of tap water and then whisked the whole lot vigorously. This produced enough batter for five small (15cm) pancakes.

The Pancake batter

Before using the batter the first time I rested it in the fridge for 30 minutes. By the time I used the batter again the second time for my tea, it had separated a bit, but a quick whisk brought it all quickly back together and it seemed fine!

Filling number 1: Savoury

Pancake filled with avocado, bacon and creme fraiche – more filling than pancake!

So the first filling I went for was my favourite savoury option: avocado, bacon and crème fraiche. Mash the flesh of one avocado and then mix in 1 tbsp of crème fraiche. Fry 100g of bacon pieces/lardons/allumnettes (I used allumnettes) until cooked and a little crispy then stir them through the avocado mix.

Pancake filled with avocado, bacon and creme fraiche, and topped with emmental

To make sure that none of the baconey goodness was wasted I then used the same frying pan (with some melted butter for lubrication) to cook the pancakes. This mixture would probably be plenty for 2 large pancakes, but since I was in the mood for indulgence I opted to use the whole lot in three (very full!) small ones instead.

I’d also found some grated emmental hiding in the back of my fridge, so sprinkled some of this over the avocado bacon mix to use it up, but I’m not sure it really added much or improved it at all. Plain old bacon, avocado and crème fraiche is pretty great by itself!

Filling number 2: Savoury and Sweet!

Pancake with caerphilly cheese, raisins and honey

Filling number 2 was a combination of caerphilly cheese (left over from the glamorgan sausages), raisins and honey. This sweet/savoury combination was inspired by one of my favourite options at the local creperie which pairs goats cheese with apple and raisins.

Melting the caerphilly cheese

For this, once I had flipped** the pancake I turned down the heat, crumbed around 30 – 40g of caerphilly cheese over the top and let it melt for a couple of minutes. Once sufficiently melted I slid the pancake onto a plate and added a sprinkle of raisins and a good squeeze of honey. The lemony tang of the caerphilly worked really well with the honey and fruit and overall I was very pleased with this experiment. One to try again!

Filling number 3: Dessert

Pancake with creme de caramel

This was the easiest ‘recipe’ of the lot. I had a jar of Bretange Crème de Caramel au beurre sel sitting in my cupboard waiting to be used and this seemed like the perfect occasion. I applied it liberally all over the pancake and rolled it up. It was delicious!

So there you go, two meals, three fillings and five pancakes – my own personal pancake day. Maybe next year I’ll add in some breakfast pancakes as well.

*Though I have tried many times, I’ve never been very good at making pancakes. While it’s entirely possible that this recipe is capable of creating deliciously fine and light crepes, I turned out my signature stodgy and heavy pancakes complete with a few lumps. You may want to source your own recipe!

**No actual “flipping” in the traditional sense occurred, I wimped out and used a spatula!